The woes of being friends with Harry Potter
by Andithiel
Summary: Hermione was not supposed to spend her morning handling a panicking Harry with a weirdly shaped mark on his wrist.


Written for Drarryland 2019, Prompt: Soulmates AU - One day Harry and Draco each wake up with an odd symbol on their skin. Write from the POV of the person(s) they seek out for help.  
Content: EWE, Hogwarts 8th year, Soulmate-identifying marks

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This was supposed to be a normal day. She'd meant to go to the library after breakfast _to study_, mind you, not handling her best friend panicking over a weirdly shaped birthmark suddenly appearing.

"So, please tell me again, step by step, what you did last night before going to bed."

Harry sat at a chair opposite her, niggling at the edge of his thumbnail.

"I already told you," he said wearily, "when I left the common room I went straight to my dorm and went to bed."

"And you didn't touch anyone on the way?"

Harry dropped his hand and blinked several times. "Who would that be? I only share a dorm with Dr-, with Malfoy, and let me tell you," he laughed, but Hermione heard the strain, "I _think _I would have remembered it if I had been… touching… him… yesterday," he continued, trailing off as the person in question entered the library. Malfoy flinched as he saw the two of them, then promptly turned and fled, blushing furiously.

Hermione turned to Harry again, narrowing her eyes. Harry was once again niggling at his thumb but was now pointedly looking anywhere but at her.

"Harry," she said, using the sweetest voice she could while stifling a laughter, "why do I get the feeling there's something you're not telling me?"

Harry looked at her, eyes wide. "I have no idea what you're talking about, Hermione."

She smiled. "I'm sure you don't. I'm also sure you don't know that that thing on your wrist," she said, indicating the miniature dragon with a lightning bolt above it, "is not a birthmark. It's a soulmark."

Harry bit his thumb in shock.

"Ow!" he said, shaking his hand. "What do you mean 'it's a soulmark'?"

"Well, I recognized it as soon as I saw it, of course," she said, shaking her sleeve up to reveal her own mark in the shape of a dog cuddling an otter.

"That's the same as Ron has!" Harry said, eyes wide.

"Exactly," she said. "It's our soulmark. It appeared after… well, it must have been after we had been in the chamber of Secrets during the battle, but of course we didn't notice it until later."

"How do you know it was after you'd been there? If you didn't see it until later?"

"_Because_, Harry, when we got back from the Chamber of Secrets that was the first time we kissed." When Harry just stared at her she continued. "A soulmark appears the first time you touch your soulmate in a… well, affectionate, or more accurate a romantic way. Like a kiss."

Harry continued staring at her. She sighed and leaned forward.

"Listen, Harry," she said in a hushed voice, "I know you two think you're being really subtle, with your furtive looks and passings of notes, but the truth is every student in eight year, and some students in the years below, have a betting pool about when you're going to go public with… well whatever it is you have going on."

Harry looked like he was going to be sick.

"_You've_ betted on it too?"

"Of course not," she sniffed. "That kind of thing is beneath me. What you do take me for?"

"So _everybody_ knows?" he hissed.

"Well, yes! I mean, you could charge a battery from the tension between you."

Harry looked at her blankly.

"Padma Patil told me she almost thought she would get pregnant just from sitting between you two yesterday in Transfiguration."

Harry gasped and Hermione wasn't sure if it was because he and Malfoy had been caught or because he couldn't believe Padma had said that.

"Well, I have been accused of many things, but I never thought I'd live to hear about me getting a _girl_ pregnant," came the characteristic drawl of Draco Malfoy.

Hermione looked behind Harry and sure enough, there was Malfoy leaning against the bookshelf.

"You know, Potter, you could have just _asked_ me what that was instead of sneaking off before I woke up," he said, and even though Hermione didn't know him very well there was no mistaking the hurt in his eyes behind the indifferent facade.

"I wasn't sneaking off, I was panicking," Harry muttered with his back still to Malfoy.

"Panicking? Why?"

"Because yesterday _meant_ something, okay? I've been thinking about doing… that," he said with a glance at Hermione (thankfully not going into more detail about what "that" meant), "with you, for a long time, but… I wasn't sure if it meant something to you too, so, I ran away. And it wasn't until I was in the Great Hall that I discovered the mark."

Malfoy was quiet for a while, then he asked "You've wanted to do that for a long time?" in a low voice.

"Well, yes!"

"So, you're not panicking about us being soulmates?"

"No!" Harry stood up so abruptly he knocked over his chair. "I'm a little shocked is all, I didn't know soulmates were a real thing, but… I'm happy it's you, Draco."

Malfoy's face lit up in a brilliant smile, something Hermione had never had the chance to see before, at least not this open. Harry leaned in and kissed Malfoy, who wrapped his arms around Harry and pressed himself closer. Hermione cleared her throat pointedly.

"Gentlemen. I'm sorry, but could you take this somewhere more private than the library?"

Harry gave her a sheepish smile before dragging Draco with him. Hermione chuckled to herself and silently prayed they wouldn't forget the silencing charms.

Ten minutes later Ron plopped down beside her, a green tint to his pale face.

"Did you see Harry and Malfoy?" she asked.

Ron nodded, he looked afraid his breakfast would return if he opened his mouth.

"Well, looks like we can make that trip to Paris after all, I just won the entire betting pool," she told him smugly.

"Wait. You mean…? Not soulmates? Please not soulmates, Hermione!"

"I'm afraid so," she said, "but look on the bright side! We won't be able to hear them all the way in Paris."

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**A/N:** Thank you so much for reading! Comments are love and I'll reply to every signed review


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